Search involves three key tasks. First, the task of recognizing for what one is searching (subject). Second, the task of recognizing content that may match the subject (content). And, third, the task of matching our understanding of the subject and content (match).
As an illustration, consider what takes place when one is searching their home for their favorite purple pen. One may say that they simply look around the house for the favorite pen but essentially, the searcher is doing three things: (1) recognizing or recollecting what the favorite pen looks like and (2) walk around and look or recognize the contents of the house and finally, (3) compare them for a match. People, search so naturally that they typically do not pay attention to these fundamental tasks of search.
When one performs a search, and perhaps either finds no result or finds a number of results, it currently is difficult to determine whether the search has been performed correctly and completely, i.e. it is difficult to determine the quality of the search that has taken place. Therefore, it would be desirable to provide a method and apparatus that allows for the determination of the quality of a search.